Under Construction May 2010

'65 Chevelle Wagon
Over The Top
Rick Billuni ran into the guys at Hot Rods and Custom Stuff in Escondido, California, many years ago. The relationship started with smaller jobs on his personal cars, then their first full build together. Rick really enjoyed that first car, and wanted another. This one would be different though; his previous cars had been 100 percent show, and he didn't spend much time on the road. This time Rick wanted something that would be just fun to drive.

1/9"This isn't Rick's first build with us, and we know it won't be the last." -<i>Sean Dell, Hot Rods and Custom Stuff</i>

Hot Rods and Custom Stuff is known for their turnkey cars, ranging from the 1920s through the 1970s. They do everything in-house from frame building to final painting, with exception of chrome and powdercoating. They start with totally unrestored, destroyed, or unfinished cars, and produce top-notch custom or restoration builds.

Rick brought a '65 Chevelle wagon that had much of the fabrication work done, but it still needed a lot. First things on the list were the exhaust, brakes, and fuel system plumbing, mounting the air conditioning unit, and setting up the stereo. Since this would be a driver, not just a show car, it would need all of the comfort items commonplace in modern cars, like plush leather-wrapped seats from a modern-day GTO and power accessories.

2/9

Next on the build list was the body. They did only minor modifications to smooth the look of the car. They shaved the gas door, smoothed the firewall, and replaced the factory drip rail with round stock. They are finishing the assembly and will unveil the car at the Grand National Roadster Show in Pomona.

By The Numbers

1965 CHEVELLE WAGON

Rick Billuni • San Marcos, CA

ENGINE

Type:

502ci big-block Chevy

Block:

factory iron

Ignition:

MSD

Cooling:

Meziere's radiator and water pump

Fuel system:

Hilborn injection

Exhaust:

custom 3-inch

mandrel-bent tubing

Fasteners:

stainless steel

DRIVETRAIN

Transmission/shifter:

Tremec

five-speed manual

Driveshaft:

custom built

Rear axle:

Ford 9-inch

CHASSIS

Front suspension:

Detroit Speed and

Engineering, Roadster Shop frame

Rear suspension:

Detroit Speed

and Engineering

Brakes:

Wilwood four-wheel disc

INTERIOR

Seats:

Pontiac GTO

Dashboard:

Stereo:

Kicker speakers and amps,

Pioneer DVD navigation unit

Wiring:

Painless

Column:

ididit

Comforts:

power windows, A/C

WHEELS/TIRES

Wheels:

Foose, 18- and 20-inch

Tires:

BFGoodrich G-Force,

225/35ZR18 and 265/35ZR20

'78 Trans Am
Roadster Obsession
Owner of Performance Restorations, Brent Jarvis, has been into racing for a long time. He held the highest licenses in NASA, SVRA, VSCDA, and NHRA. He's also well-versed in both road racing and drag racing. With this much time around these awesome machines, he saw for himself what was missing, and wanted to build cars the way he felt they should be built. He started his shop in 1988, and has created some amazing cars since then.

3/9"The details of the drivetrain haven't been ironed out, but I guarantee it will allow the TA to really move." <i>-Brent Jarvis, builder</i>

One of his current projects is this '78 Pontiac Trans Am. He met the owners of this car at an auction. They asked Brent to look over some cars they were looking to buy, and Brent was able to point out the bad apples, and save them a lot of money and frustration. They quickly became friends with a shared interest in muscle cars. You may remember the Charger roadster previously featured in this column, that belonged to Josh and Francis too. They live in Chicago, so the cars would have to be tough to keep up with the potholes and rough roads the harsh winters produce. This wouldn't be a problem for Brent. "Josh comes up with these ideas for custom cars, and if they are possible, I call Murray Pfaff and we have him design them. Once we all agree on a concept, I bring the drawings into the fabrication shop and my guys build the cars," Brent says. They have worked with each other enough that the builds now go very smoothly and they have a mutual understanding of what is needed. Brent sourced a great body to start with that had absolutely no rust on it. The body's frame structure needed to be in excellent condition, because removing the top takes away some of the built-in structure that would have to be absorbed by the undercarriage-that's why it started with some heavy-duty subframe connectors and bracing.

By The Numbers

1978 Trans Am

Josh Fishkin and Francis Wisneski

400 hp

ENGINE

Type:

400ci Pontiac

Camshaft:

COMP Cams High Energy series

Valvetrain:

COMP Cams

Induction:

Edlebrock Performer,

Holley 650-cfm HP

Ignition:

MSD

Cooling:

HD cooling system

Fuel system:

Edlebrock mechanical fuel pump

Exhaust:

Hedman headers,

custom 2 1/2-inch exhaust,

Flowmaster mufflers

DRIVETRAIN

Transmission/shifter:

Turbo 400

Rear axle:

3.23 gears

CHASSIS

Front suspension:

QA1 shocks,

Energy Suspension bushings,

offset upper A-arm shafts,

W6 components

Rear suspension:

leaf spring with

7/8-inch sway bar,

Energy, QA1 shocks

Brakes:

four-wheel Wilwood disc

WHEELS/TIRES

Wheels:

Honeycomb style, 20-inch

Tires:

Goodyear F1

'68 AMX
Xtreme Build
It started with Peter White, from the Boston area, who bought this '68 AMX in 1981. He drove the car through his last years of high school, then college. Once he got his final graduation papers, he moved to New York City, an environment not suitable for such a neat classic car. The car sat in storage for the next 15 years. Peter moved back to the suburbs of Wellesley, Massachusetts, with his wife and two kids. Life was stable there and he wanted to bring the AMX out of hiding and back onto the street. He charged the battery, replaced the spark plugs, and the thing fired right up. One Thursday (this he remembers clearly) he took the car out to grab dinner for the family when the front left wheel fell off. He decided that now was a good time to do a complete restoration.

6/9"It's something I wasn't expecting, and more than I could have ever imagined." <i>-Peter White, AMX owner</i>

Peter brought it to a shop where it spent three years for a relatively minor project. He decided to pull the car out of that shop and look for another one to finish it right. Peter gathered some business cards at the Boston World of Wheels show, and that's what brought him to Xtreme Restoration of Slatersville, Rhode Island.

7/9

Todd Lewis, owner of the shop, started out working for his neighbor's body shop out of high school, and quickly tired of the mundane crash repairs on minivans. When he was 22 years old, he started his first shop that grew to 28 employees, with 50 to 60 projects at a time. He sold the business, and started Xtreme where he could build more extreme projects.

8/9

Peter took a tour of Todd's shop, and decided to bring his AMX over to be completed. As we've all heard many times before, it came in for a typical restoration with some minor upgrades, but has since turned into a massive transformation of the car. The idea was to build it bigger and better without losing the classic look and feel of the original. They took care to leave the dash in its original form, but modified it heavily. Yes, they could have done an aluminum dash plate for one-third the price, but it wouldn't follow the theme they were after. This project has turned in a direction greater than Peter expected, and he couldn't be more excited for the final product.